A Safe and Sound Constructive 
Industrial System 



BY 



JAMES H. L I G H T F T 
An Examiner of Patents 



This paper, which appears in the November number of the 
Journal of the Patent Office Society under the title "A Proposed De- 
partment of Invention and Discovery", presents a development from 
the matter involving fundamental truths as treated in papers read 
before the Examining Corps September 28, 1916, and before the 
Junior Examiners February 7, 1918, and is Intended to define a 
program or system by which those truths may be put into practical 
effect and without which the requirement of the Constitutional pro- 
vision may not be fairly complied with. 



COPYiRIGHT 1918 
Our' 19 IQh. 



JUNE 22, 1918 



A Safe and Sound Constructive 
Industrial System. 

By James H. Lio:htfoot, Examiner. 



[This paper presents a development from the matter in- 
volving fundamental principles as treated in papers read 
before the examining corps September 28, 1916, and be- 
fore the junior examiners February 7, 1918, and is intend- 
ed to define a program or system by which those principles 
may be put Into practical effect and without which the 
requirements of the constitutional provision may not be 
fairly complied with.] 



If we as individuals and as a nation are to be industri- 
ally and economically prepared and efficient to meet the 
necessities of war as well as to compete for industrial su- 
premacy in times of peace, it is essential that our condi- 
tion of' industrial procrress and preparedness be based 
upon certain and secure foundations. 

There can be no healthful growth or substantial per- 
manency in our national or private industries if they be 
founde(i uj>on unsettled, insecure, or defective rights. ^ 

The problems involved in making America industri- 
ally sound, etlicient and prepared are real, serious and 
most highly controlling. These problems cannot be 
solved except by the active application of fundamentally 
right principles of industrial progress, security and effi- 
ciency. 

DuVing tin' past four years or more there have been 
sufficient evidences of the need and value of systems of 
industrial, economic and military preparedness and effi- 
ciency, and there have l)een sufficient evidences of disas- 
ter due to the want of such systems to convince even the 
most pronounced reactionary of the urgent need of a high- 
ly organized and efficient in<lustrial system. 

Since it is right and essential in a most important sense 
that the inventive genius and forces of the nation have 
been marshaled, encouraged, fostered and systemized to 
win the war for freedom and for real civilization, it must 
be equally important and right that the inventive forces 
of tlic nation ])(' encouraged, fostered, and made secure 



:U'/9^^ 



as to their rights, in order that we may win the industrial 
contest that will follow the termination of the present 
war. 

Our President has said that ' ' The world must be made 
safe for democracy''. However, in order that this de- 
sired object may be attained and permanently main- 
tained, it is essential that industrial rights be made safe 
and secure and that those men of original thought and ac- 
tion who have orginated all the devices that have 
made and will make victory possible in war and indus- 
trial supremacy possible in times of peace, be encour- 
aged and given due and certain reward for their import- 
ant achievements. 

In other words it is essential that the patent system be 
made safe for inventors, and for all manufacturing and 
business interests based upon invented things. 

With true prophetic vision the framers of our Consti- 
tution have directed and constructed the safest and 
soundest foundation for the most efficient system of in- 
dustrial progress and security. The words of the Consti- 
tution: ''Congress shall have power to promote the prog- 
ress of science and the useful arts by securing for a lim- 
ited time to inventors * * the exclusive rights to 
their * * discoveries", constitute the source of in- 
spiration and the vital fundamental authority for the 
origination and establishment of all of our national, cor- 
porate and private industries upon firm and secure foun- 
dations, and it is essential to the proper promotion of in- 
dustrial progress and stable, safe and sound business 
conditions that the terms of this constutional provision 
be fully and strictly complied with in our laws and in our 
practices. 

However, although the Patent System has been estab- 
lished for more than one hundred years, and although 
our nation has prospered and progressed industrially un- 
der its provisions, inventors have not been made secure 
and exclusive in their rights in such full measure as the 
Constitution directs. 

And, notwithstanding the fact that there have been 
gradual improvements during the past century in some 
respects, although there have been some laudable re- 
forms in recent years, and although able Commissioners 

—2— 



uf l*atc'iit> lia\i' cihU'avorc'd to jjroduce needed reforms 
iiiulcr discouraging circumstances, the following condi- 
tions requiring remedial action still exist: 

( 1 ) All patents granted are still merely prima facie 
evidence of tlie rights of inventors to their inventions, 
whereas tlie grant itself and the Constitution provide for 
the LTiJiit of unconditional, secure aii<l exclusive rights. 

(2) Although the statute (4886) requires, as a condi- 
tion }>r(('i'dr)it t(t tJir finntt. that tin* alleged invention 
sought to he patented must have been in fact invented^ 
patents have been granted and are still granted for things 
not invented, because of insufficient time and inadequate 
facilities for tlu' j)ro])er consideration of this important 
(piestion, and patents have been and are still refused be- 
cause of the want of a proper system requiring the pre- 
sentation of practical evidences indicating invention , for 
the consideration of the examiner. 

(o) Although the statute (4886) I'equires, as a condi- 
tion prect'dcfit to tiic f/rant, that the alleged invention 
sought to be patented must be neir. patents have been 
granted and are still granted for things not neWf because 
of the want of proper facilities and snflicient time for full 
and fair searches in domestic and foi-eicrn patents an<i 
}»ul)lieations. 

(4) Although the statute (4886) requires as a condi- 
tion precedent to the qraht, that the subject matter sought 
to be patented nn;>t hv nsrful and undei- Statute 4S1KJ 
that it must be '■'' sufjicientlii useful (md important, pat- 
(Uits are still granted for theoretical and sometimes prac- 
tically useless alleged inventions, which have later consti- 
tuted bars to the irrant of |)atent< to inventors of real 
inventions that would have practically promoted the in- 
dustrial arts, this condition ])eing due to the fact that no 
facilities have been afforded for properly determining 
the question of utility or practicability so essential to the 
practical promotion of industrial progress. 

(o) AltlKHigh the statute (4886) requires as conditions 
precedent to the grant, (a) that the alleged invention 
must not have ])een known ru- used by others in this 
country before the applicant's invention or discovery 
theiM^of; (b) that the alleged invention must not have 
been in p}t})Jic nsc or on saJr in this country fur more 



than two years prior to the ai)plication; (c) and that the 
alleged invention must not have become abandoned, pat- 
ents generally have been granted without any investiga- 
tion of these important questions affecting validity, be- 
cause no system for the general investigation of these 
(Questions before the patent is granted has ever been pro- 
vided. 

(6) Although Eev. Stat. 490::) plainly requires that 
helpful ^information" be furnished to applicants to aid 
them in obtaining proper protection, patents are still 
granted the claims of which are so limited in scope as to 
be valueless to the inventor or his assignee owing to the 
want of a uniform standardized system of examining ap- 
plications from the standpoint of the inventor as well as 
from the standpoint of the public. 

(7) Although the provisions of Rev. Stat. 4904 are 
l)road, comprehensive and directory in providing for no- 
tice in all cases of interfering applications or interfering 
applications and patents, patents are still granted which 
are rendered practically valueless and the industries 
based therein practically ruined by the subsequent grant 
of interfering patents granted on copending applications 
of which the former patentees had no statutory notice 
during the copendency of such applications. 

(8) And patents are still litigated in courts which, 
with some few able exceptions, are not specially qualified 
promptly and properly to determine the technical ques- 
tions arising under the patent laws. 

These unfortunate actualities which have produced un- 
settled, unsafe and unsound business conditions would 
doubtless largely have been remedied had the people gen- 
erally been educated as to the true importance and real 
meaning of the Patent System ; had inventors and manu- 
facturers realized that it is essential to their own safe 
and secure interests that patent applications be examined 
from the standpoint of inventors as well as from the 
standpoint of the public, in a spirit of helpful cooperation 
with inventors and attorneys ; and had the Congress real- 
ized its constitutional responsibilities in providing men, 
means and all facilities for the proper, thorough and full 
consideration of all pending cases in the Patent Office 
and for the proper adjudication of all patent cases in the 
courts. 



The business interests of the nation in general, the in- 
terests of the manufacturer, the capitalist, the investing 
public and the highest interest of inventors who have ori- 
ginated and made all of our industries possible, all de- 
mand that reforms in the above-named particulars and 
others be effectively made in order that the foundations 
of industrial enterprise may be made safe, secure and 
free from the complexities and uncertainties of long liti- 
gation in the courts and of long prosecution in the Pat- 
ent Office. 

A system that may, if made uniform, remedy some at 
least of the defects noted above so far as the considera- 
tion of alleged inventions by the Patent Office is con- 
cerned, it is thought, should include the mature and thor- 
ough analysis and examination of the subject matter pre- 
sented in patent applications both from the standpoint of 
inventors and from the standpoint of the public in a 
spirit of helpful cooperation with inventors and attor- 
neys and with full consideration of the educational, con- 
tractual and constitutional characters of the patent grant. 
An attempt has been made to treat this kind of examina- 
tion and analysis of patent applications in a paper read 
before the corps of examiners on September 28, 1916, 
and, in a more elementary way in a paper read before the 
junior examiners on February 7, 1918. 

It is obvious that full, fair and complete examinations 
of ''alleged inventions" as required by statutory and 
constitutional provisions as above noted, may not be 
made by the present inadequate force of examiners, with 
inadequate time and inadequate facilities and equipment 
for such essential work. 

However, if full and complete provision in men, in 
equipment and in all facilities were made so as to enable 
the examiners to carry into practical eifect the plain 
terms of the Constitution and of the statutes as noted 
above, in the examination of alleged inventions in patent 
applications, it is submitted that there still would remain 
much more that should be done, beyond the scope of the 
examiners' work, in relation to a broader field, clearly 
within the plain broad terms of the constitutional pro- 
vision for promoting industrial progress by making in- 
ventors secure in their inchoate rights before application 

—5— 



is filed as well as in their rights after the patent is 
granted. 

In order to indicate comparatively the character of 
such a system that should be established, in order to 
more fully comply with constitutional and statutory re- 
quirements, attention is called to the remarkable system 
of promoting the progress and efficiency of the agricul- 
tural arts that has been effected by the Department of 
Agriculture alone and by this Department in coopera- 
tion with State Agricultural Colleges. 

A few years ago, comparatively, the Department of 
Agriculture was a minor section of the Patent Office, the 
principal function of \\^hich was to issue seed to farmers. 
Afterwards, in 1862, under Commissioner Isaac Newton, 
this agricultural section became an independent bureau, 
and in 1889 under Commissioner Coleman, it became an 
executive department of the highest rank with Cabinet 
representation. Today it stands as our most useful In- 
dustrial Department, with normally about fifteen thous- 
and employees engaged in promoting one general line of 
industry, while the Patent Office is provided with onl\' 
about four hundred examiners who are charged with the 
constitutional duty of promoting all lines of industry^ by 
making inventors secure and exclusive in their rights. 

The Section Chiefs, the Bureau Commissioners and 
the Secretaries of Agriculture and their associates in 
work, with clear conceptions of the great possiblities of 
promoting sound scientific agricultural development, 
have established an active system of promoting the prog- 
ress of the agricultural industry by educating the farm- 
er and farmer's boy, through bulletins and by per- 
sonal instruction and demonstration in every detail of 
agricultural knowledge essential to efficiency and success, 
so that today American farmers thus educated and or- 
ganized constitute the backbone and the body of a stand- 
ardized system that is furnishing food to all our allies 
and to neutrals and abundantly supplies our home mar- 
kets. 

This department has established a Bureau of Soils to 
teach the farmer how to prepare the soil to produce bet- 
ter crops and how to cure soil defects and insufficiencies. 

They have established a Bureau of Plant Industry to 

—6— 



investigate and teach seed selection, crop selection, bet- 
ter crop ])rodnction, cnltivation and ntilization. 

They have established a Bureau of Entomology to car- 
ry into elt'ect measures to eliminate loss of crops due to 
the enemies of plant life and growth. 

They have estal)lishe(i a l^urcau of C'licMnistry to deter 
mine tlie food values of vegetal)le growths and to deter- 
mine the pro<lucing values of soil and fertilization needs 
for the same. 

They have established in many localities Government 
Experiment Stations and an ellicient corps of field agents 
in ]>ractically evci'v county in tin* country who tak<* the 
spirit of j)rogress and cllicicMicy of the departmental sys- 
tem directly to the farmers, and, knowing full well that 
the efficient fanners of tin* future are best made by in- 
structing the farmers* boys of today, they have estab- 
lishiMJ niod«'i"niz(*d systems for tcacliing and encouraging 
tin* work of tin* ))()ys on the farm. 

Tliey have establishe<] a r^ur<'au of Markets and Rural 
Organizations to teach the farmer the best marketing 
methods for the products of his fariii, for his protection 
and to prevent loss and failure to ac<juin' a j)roj)er return 
for his productive la})or and skill. 

Th(»s(» are souk* only of tin* many up-to-date activitie.^ 
of this most wonderfully systematized institution, yet 
great and wonderful as it has grown to be there would 
probably have been little of agricultuial ])rogress and de- 
velopment and little need of an Agricultural Department 
were it not for the thousan<l and one agricultural imple- 
!]ients, machines, processes, fertilizing agents, the means 
of transportation for crops and tiie great factories, mills 
and plants for the treatm<»nt and production of agricul- 
tural products, that have been produced by inventors un- 
<ler the Patent System and through the mcnlium of the 
Patent Bureau. 

Xot only W(ndd there be little need for an Agricultural 
Department were it not for the fact that inventors have 
made modern agriculture possible, but it is also true that 
then* would be little need of a War De]iartment were it 
not for all of the engines and devices for war originated 
by inventors under the encouragement and inducements 
offered by the Patent System, and there would likewise 
be little need of a Xavy Department without the ironclad, 



the submarine, and the wireless, produced under the en- 
couragement of the Patent System by inventors and dis- 
coverers. 

The Department of Commerce and the Post Office De- 
partment would be minor institutions without invented 
means of transportation and transmission of intelligence, 
and the Department of Labor would probably never have 
been established were it not for the fact that invented 
machines, new arts, new industries, new implements of 
labor, have lifted labor from its low dependent state to 
the plane of the intelligent, skilled workman constituting 
a material factor in our industrial growth and life. 

Yet, notwithstanding the fact that the Patent System, 
the Patent Office, the inventor, have made possible not 
only practically every governmental industry and activ- 
ity, but also every individual and corporate industrial en- 
terprise, the people generally have been kept in ignor- 
ance of the true meaning and wise provisions of the Pat- 
ent System, and the functions of the Patent Office, its 
real importance and its urgent needs are little known and 
still less appreciated. 

It is maintained that to constitute a fairly full compli- 
ance with the constitutional requirements, and in order 
that it may fairly measure up to the extent and import- 
ance of its constitutional foundation, the Patent Bureau 
should develop into an executive department of the high- 
est grade and through its bureaus and divisions should 
direct, encourage, foster and protect inventions and dis- 
coveries in all of the industrial arts, just as the Agricul- 
tural Section or Bureau of the Patent Office has devel- 
oped into the Department of Agriculture and has direct- 
ed, encouraged, fostered and protected new and im- 
proved means and processes of promoting the progress 
of the agricultural arts and industries. 

This greater and better institution should be our most 
important national industrial department because its 
work would furnish the foundations for and would pro- 
mote the activities of all other departments. 

If the plain broad terms of the constitutional provision 
are to be practically applied in the activities of this new 
industrial department, it may be that its field of work 
should be svstematized somewhat as follows : 



-8— 



1. An Executive Bureau. 

This new <lej)artnioiit should ])e under the control of 
an executive officer of distinct a])ility, free from political 
bias, who should be an industrial and efficiency expert. 
Directly and through competent associates, this official 
should maintain systems of efficiency and standardization 
in the various })ureaus in keej)in<x with this <i:reater ])ro- 
gram for promoting industrial ])rogress and stal)ility. 
Under the direct control of this Secretar}' of the Depart- 
ment of Invention and Discovery a system should be 
estai)lished foi- the promotion of a high standard of effi- 
ciency and rtliical standing annuig practitioners and a 
spint of })rogressive and constructive efficiency among 
officials of all classes in his department. 

2. The Bureau of Information and Education. 

This bureau shouhl be ecpiipped with men and full fa- 
cilitie> for promoting the disx-mination of knowledge of 
the tru«* meaning and provisions of the l^atent System. 

Specially is this essential because in its most funda- 
mental sense the Patent System is an industrial educa- 
tional system and it constitutes one of our most glaring 
national erroi'> that the public in whose interests the Pat- 
ent Sy>t<*m was estal)lis|ied has been kept in iirnoi-ance of 
its true meaning an^l intent. 

This Educational Bureau should be cliarged with the 
duty of (establishing a system to instruct the inventing 
public as to how to prepare to nuike inventions, how to 
invent in the interest of the publie, and with profit to 
themselves, what to invent, how to avoid losses through 
abandonment or want of knowledge as to how to proceed 
after conception or reduction to practice to avoid compli- 
cations, how to obtain patents of value, how to study the 
prior arts before inventing, how to select competent at- 
torneys, in fact everything connectcMl with making and 
patenting and maik«'ting inventions just as the Depart- 
ment of Agiiculture has, through bulletins, publications 
and tield aireiits, instructed the fanner in all respects 
liow to idepnie to produce crops, how to produce them, 
how to protect and conserve them when produced and 
how to market them in the mo>t efficient way. 

The incalculal)le \alues in time, money and energy that 

—9— 



have been wasted in inventing useless things, in reinvent- 
ing things that have been shown to be old, and the great 
values in inventions lost to the nation because the inven- 
tors have not known how properly to develop them to ma- 
terial form and how to have them properly disclosed and 
protected in letters patent, clearly indicate the great 
need of educational work along these lines. 

The workmen in the shops and factories, in the labora- 
tories and on the farms know little if anything of their 
rights or responsibilities in relation to invention, and 
manufacturers and their employees know little in rela- 
tion to the same. 

This condition has resulted in the grant of many pat- 
ents to employers for inventions made by employees and 
has resulted in granting some patents to employees that 
have been made by employers, all of which patents being 
thus rendered invalid, have produced complex business 
conditions. 

If it be true, as has been stated, that unscrupulous in- 
dustrial institutions have pirated inventions in various 
stages of their development and that an enemy propa- 
ganda has been extended even to pirating inventions 
in the making and before being patented, it is clear that 
inventors should be taught to protect their inventions in 
the making and when completed from these enemies and 
from others who would pirate them. 

And if the spirit of inventions is to be encouraged, fos- 
tered and promoted in the national interests, it is quite 
obvious that this Educational Bureau should seek to pro- 
mote the instruction and study in our educational insti- 
tutions of the philosophy of invention and the true mean- 
ing and importance of the Patent System. 

Included in this Educational Bureau may be a corps 
of Patent Field Agents, just as there are Agricultural, 
Land and Pension Field Agents, who in cooperation with 
inventors, attorneys, manufacturers and capitalists, 
should seek to aid, in every possible way, the interests of 
inventors and manufacturers, because in this way the 
public interests will best be subserved. 

The Division of Information of this bureau should be a 
well organized institution of well qualified experts who 
should furnish full and accurate information to solicitors, 

—10— 



inventors and industrial institutions, as to fields of va- 
lidity search, and as to all matters in relation to proced- 
ure and practices involved in the activities of the de- 
partment. 

3. Bureau of Patents ajid Publications. 

Thi> institution -hould liavc an able statT of miMi to 
establish and maintain an efficient classification of pat- 
ents and an efficient classified library of all statutory 
publications relatins: to the industrial arts. This staff 
of specialists should proi)erly dicrest publications for 
quick and thorou<^h search purposes. It should by a 
re^adar standardized system seek to procure industrial 
literature from manufacturers and from all other sources 
and should classify and syst<Miiatiz<' them for ready re- 
search purposes. This bureau should also cooperate with 
Patent Fi<'id A<j:ents to procure evidence of prior knowl- 
edge and use, prior public use, and workshop and labora- 
tory expedients and practices, and classify them for 
ready reference by tlie examiners. Under the jurisdiction 
of tliis bureau tliere should i)e established in g'iven indus- 
trial centers, complete classified sets of patents and pub- 
lications, just as they should be classified and arran.2:<Ml in 
the Patent Office for official research work, it being ob- 
vious that the present system of requiring men from all 
])arts of tlie country to make searches in one set of such 
patents located in Washington is distinctly inefficient and 
antiquated. 

4. A Bureau or Division of Utility. 

This bureau should be equipped with laboratories, and 
all necessary equipment and competent workmen who will 
co(")])erate with the examiners in accurately determining, 
before patents are granted, the practibalitiy and opera- 
tiveness of alleged inventions under consideration. It is 
submitted that it is contrary- to public interests and to 
the interests of real inventors and of manufacturers, that 
patents be granted upon merely theoretical ideas and 
])ractically useless alleged inventions which may techni- 
cally constitute bars or improper limitations upon the 
grant of ])ate]its for later inventions of real merit, wliich 
being reduced to practical and efficient form would ma- 
terially promote industrial progress. 

—11 — 



5. A Bureau of Validity Examinations. 

This bureau should be fully equipped with well quali- 
fied men, including an additional .2:rade of re-examiners 
to re-examine claims held allowable by other assistant 
examiners, this new grade ranking between the first as- 
sistant and principal examiner. 

The work of this corps of specialists should be so sys- 
tematized and arranged that each should have full time 
and facilities to examine the subject-matter of each appli- 
cation under his consideration thoroughly, from the 
standpoint of the inventor as well as from the stand- 
point of the public, so that when granted patents may af- 
ford inventors full protection and be essentially valid, 
thus constituting a safe and sound basis for the estab- 
lishment of industries and safe and secure investments 
for the capitalists who may promote the establishment 
thereof. 

6. A Bureau of Priority of Invention. 

The present divisions of interference should be expand- 
ed into a Bureau of Priority for the full, complete and 
final determination of ,the question of priority between 
copending applications or applications and patents con 
taining common patentable subject-matter. It is essen- 
tial to the establishment of safe and secure rights that 
the question of priority be promptly, thoroughly and 
finally determined within the bureau, and that this ques- 
tion be not extended through various appeals in the Pat- 
ent Office and then further and indefinitely extended 
through various appeals in the courts. With a com- 
petent and efficient Bureau of Priority the questions at 
issue may be fairly and finally determined by judicial 
officers within the bureau, it being a matter of much im- 
portance that the patents when granted be free from fur- 
ther interference complication if they are to constitute 
bases for the establishment of industries, or if they be 
importantly involved in an industry already established. 

The injury to established industry and the discourage- 
ment to inventors, manufacturers and investors due to 
the subsequent grant of patents that dominate or invali- 
date patents formerly granted on copending interfering 
applications Vvdthout notice, have created a condition so 

—12^ 



obviously violative of the grant of secure and exclusive 
rights that distinct reforms slionkl be effected. As it is 
essential to a safe and sound industrial system that pat- 
ents be granted that are essentially valid in view of the 
prior published arts, so also it is equally if not more es- 
sential to such safe and sound industrial system that pat- 
ents, wlien granted, be free from furtlier interference by 
domination or invalidization by copending later granted 
patents of which the former patentees had no notice 
while their cases were pending. 

W'hik* being properly <M|uipp(Ml with qualified men to 
properly determine the cjuestion of priority, this bureau 
should also include men who may sit as commissioners to 
take testimonv and determine the admissibilitv thereof, 
so that when tlie testimony reaches the tril)unal to deter- 
mine priority, only the proper legal evidence may be 
considered. 

In order that the question of priority may be finally 
determined witliin this bureau, tliere should be a Board 
of Tnterfi^renoc Appeals consist iiiir nf <p«'cially (jualified 
men who may properly hear and finally decide appeals 
from the decision of tlie examiners of interference. Tiii> 
appellate board of specially qualified men would be more 
apt to render fair and just final decisions than would tri- 
bunals that are not thus specially qualified. 

7. This greater and broader Department of Invention 
and Discovery may possibly also include a Bureau of Jji 
censes and Sales, just as tlie Department of Agriculture 
has a Bureau of Markets. 

Such a bureau as this may be found useful in prevent- 
ing impositions and frauds u[)on inventors by unscrupu- 
lous profiteers; in })ringing the buyer and seller together 
in a way that would be for the best interests of the in 
ventor and the capitalist; and in general by advising in- 
ventors and patentees how they may properly market 
their inventions if they be of marketable value. It is a 
well known fact that it has been too often the case that 
inventors who have produced by their own ingenuity new 
forms of property value to the public have derived little 
or no benefit from their important work, and a properly 
conducted division or bureau of the character named may 
in due time work out some scheme bv which the inventor 



13— 



may be assured of a just reward for tiie benefits he con- 
fers upon the public. 

8. And, as has been suggested by a very able patent 
la\vyer representing important industrial interests, this 
greater industrial department should include among its 
activities, a competent Patents Court of specially quali- 
fied jurists, to promptly and finally determine the ques- 
tions of validity and infringement. 

The foregoing is a mere cursory and inadequate pre- 
sentation of a very important subject and it is hoped that 
others abler and more capable may appreciate the im- 
portance of properly presenting this matter in a way 
that may result in iiiaiigurating an effective movement to 
establish a safe and sound industrial system under the 
constitutional provision to which attention has been in- 
vited. 

It is appreciated that there is no instantaneous pro- 
cess by which a bureau with fixed practices of long stand- 
ing can be enlarged or converted into an executive de- 
partment for greater and larger lines of work, but it is 
believed that just as some able men encouraged and sup- 
ported by the agricultural interests have in due time con- 
verted the small '^section'' of the Patent Bureau into 
the great Department of Agriculture, just so other able 
men, with clear conceptions of industrial needs, if en- 
couraged and supported by all industrial interests affect- 
ed by the Patent System, may in due time convert the 
Patent Office into a Department of Invention and Dis- 
covery, with full powers for promoting the progress of 
science and the useful arts under the Constitution in the 
interest of national and individual industrial efficiency 
and preparedness, and to promote and establish a safe 
and sound industrial system based upon secure and ex- 
clusive rights in letters patent. 

Should a program or system such as that referred to 
herein be put into practical etfect the following results 
would doubtless accrue therefrom: 

1. The patent system would be popularized among the 
people just as the work of the Department of Agriculture 
has become popularized, and it would be made construc- 
tively efficient. 

2. The Patent System having been popularized and 

—14— 



the people generally having been educated as to the true 
meaning and importance thereof, there would of necessity 
be a greater and more general development and exercise 
of tlic iuNcntive faculty and the jjower of original thouglit 
in the public and individual intcM'csts. 

.'1. Inventors would be encouraged more actively to 
promote the progress of the useful arts by the produc- 
tion of new and useful things, knowing as they would 
that they would be better protected and made more se- 
cure in their rights. 

4. Manufacturers would feel more assured that their 
plants were establislied upon more secure and safe foun- 
dations and they would be encouraged more actively to 
engage in constructive industi'ial business. 

5. The cajiitalist an<l the promoter knowing that in- 
dustrial rights under letters patents were made more 
safe and secure, would more freely and actively invest in 
and encourage the establishment of manufacturing and 
industrial enterprises. 

6. Necessarily with this industrial growth and this in- 
creased activity of inventors, manufacturers and capi- 
^;;ll<t< (hir' tr> the nroiiiotioii of safe and secure rights, the 
professional business and legitimate services of ethical 
attorneys and solicitors, whose able work for inventors 
and manufacturers has been a large contributing factor 
in our industrial growth, would be correspondingly in- 
creased and made of more imj)ortance and value. 

7. And more important still, the industrial interests of 
the nation, its governmental interests, individual inter- 
ests, general professional interests, corporation interests, 
all matei'ial interests and other interests dependent 
tiiereupon, would be vitalize<l and put in a safe, progress- 
sive, secure condition. 



—15 



liil 



LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 



019 974 481 1 i 



